Apologia of Socrates and the Defense Speech of Gorgias - Term Paper Example

Socrates defense against his case before the Athenian council are based on the principle of his curiosity and the facts that he seeks to comprehend. This is concerning and in response to his accusers that attempt to label him as an evil doer for seeking to acquire knowledge beyond that which is conventionally visible and understandable. As such, his accusers are numerous and his crimes or counts of evil doing span a long time, in which case his accusers being many do not give him an objective approach to his defense in that he cannot mention them by name and listen to them on one to one basis in order to reply to their allegations. Therefore, because of this his defense is not perfect, as it only addresses his accusers as a crowd and not as individuals who bring their arguments and cases against him, but are rather guarded by the crowd. In addition, his issues are that the arguments and cases against him have been built over a long time and not a one-time thing, which implies that the same people charging him feign ignorance over the actual value of his works and beliefs (Adams). With this in mind, his charges are not even valid or based on actual occurrences, but are just accusations that have developed over an extended period and terms of heresy from other people. This makes his defense a bit shaky as all cases against other philosophers who seek to gain an understanding and acquire an explanation of occurrences are leveled against him as the perpetrator of them all. In his defense, Socrates states that his role in life is to examine the wisdom of man and expose their false ways and wisdom as ignorance, which he says is part of why he is being charged. This is because his activities expose many prominent people and embarrass theme while Socrates gains acclaim from the youths of Athens (Tindale). In addition, it is because of this that he is charged, or so he states, and proceeds to defend himself through cross examining one of his accusers, Meletus. In his questioning of Meletus, Meletus ends up contradicting himself repeatedly, in which case he loses credibility since he attempts to make Socrates appear guilty for his crimes and activities (Jowett). In addition, Socrates’ defense goes on to be speculative of the Athenian justice system, where he discusses the different punishments that he is likely to face and how they would affect his activities. His conclusion is that there is none of theme that would see him change his ways, but they would instead change the ways of the Athenian people, as they shall continue to be misled. Moreover, his defense based on this line of thought appears to be and is valid since Socrates' apologia attempts to show the people their wrong ways and how ignorant they are in being led by people who are as ignorant as they are, thus he cannot change his philosophy. In addition, his defense shows a hint of arrogance in that even after he is found guilty, he goes on to make sarcastic comments that if the jury had been any more patient, nature would naturally have killed him rather than the jury condemning him to death. This might be the weakest point in his defense, though he does stand his ground for his ways and goes on to ridicule the jury that the punishment given can be changed should he decide to change his ways by saying or doing anything that the jury wishes. This makes his defense even stronger as he appears as a person willing to do anything for his cause including ignoring convention. On the other hand, in the defense of Palamedes Gorgias makes a case based on the credibility of the individual and not on the crimes that he is said to have committed, it is in the same way that it does not focus on the punishment that the individual is likely to face (“Gorgias”). As such, his argument and that of Socrates’ apologia have similar principles in that Gorgias refers to the use of normal speech to prove his case, rather than follow the unfamiliar speech found to be used before a jury, and this he does by stating his case against the accuser (Massoni). In this case, the accuser is Odysseus, and is said that should the accuser be issuing wrongful allegations against Gorgias, then he is a no better man as compared to rest of the population. One way in which the defense of Palamedes is different from that of Socrates is that the defense of Palamedes is strongly backed by facts that the indicted party strongly sticks to ensure that Odysseus is discredited as not using facts. He does this by stating that if he personally knows that he did not commit the crimes for which he is being charged, then the accusing party cannot have proof that the crime was actually committed by the accused. This he further backs with proof based on logical principles as he attempts to put his case together in that treason must be discussed before any action is taken against the party in question, where in this case is Greece. As such, he moves on to state that no meeting took place for the discussions to be held as none of the parties was in a position to go to the other. Therefore, he concludes written communication that could not take place for the same reason and they could not communicate directly with one another, as none understands the other’s language, which would beat all logic of even having an interpreter mediate the language barrier. This shows the great use of detailed information, which is largely lacking in Socrates’ apologia, though Socrates, does apply logic in his argument, but not for exoneration purposes (Tindale). Socrates’ logic is applied to discredit his accusers by humiliating them, while Gorgias does the exact opposite by discrediting the accusers based on the loopholes in their allegations. Moreover, Gorgias goes on further to implicate the accusers as being part of the intricate plan to implicate Gorgias as part of the betrayal of Greece to the barbarians. He does this by asking for details in relation to time and locations because, should the information be from their own knowledge, then they must have been a party. Moreover, if it is not their knowledge, it is all based on heresy, as was the case of Socrates, which Socrates does not handle as meticulously as Gorgias does. In addition, Gorgias case takes advantage of the facts by questioning the credibility of the accuser by showing contradicting terms, as was the case of Socrates, on which Socrates did not capitalize. It is in this way that had Gorgias written the defense for Socrates, they would have been a marked difference in the usage of facts for the purpose of exoneration and Gorgias philosophy beats that of Socrates by far, in that Socrates’ lacks full use of logic and metaphysics in analysis of his situation before embarking on his defense. In conclusion, Socrates’ defense and Gorgias in the defense of Palamedes have fundamental differences in that their application of logic is different, as so is their levels of philosophical thought. In addition, they share a similar connection in logical thought, but the difference is manifested in the application of the same logic in stating their cases as Gorgias makes a solid defense as opposed to Socrates. Works cited Jowett, Benjamin. Apology. 2009. Web. 27 Feb. 2013. Tindale, Christopher. Textual allusion as rhetorical argumentation: Gorgias, Plato and Isocrates. n.d. Web. 27 Feb. 2013. Massoni, Rachel. The Apology of Socrates: An Analysis. Yahoo! Inc. 2009. Web. 27 Feb. 2013. Adams, John. Soccrates’ Apology. 2010. Web. 27 Feb 2013. “Gorgias”. 2009. Web. 27 Feb. 2013. Read More